Question:

Analytical Term Paper about the importance of children in the Civil Rights Movement. Children have always been overseen in this matter.
Need a Thesis, historical perspective, monographs?
It should be in argumentative style addressing the question/issue clear structure that can be laid out in the content. You can give each chapter a heading
conclusion should be a synthesis of your work and sum up what you have been doing in the paper.

Answer:

CHILDREN IN THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT

Contents

Chapter 1: Introduction. 3

Chapter 2: The Role of Children in the Civil Rights Movement 4

Chapter 3: Children Participation and Political Issues within the Civil Rights Movement 8

Chapter 4: Young Southern Blacks’ Contribution to Renewed Vigor in the Civil Rights Movement 10

Chapter 5: Reasons for Children’s Participation in the Civil Rights Movement 12

Chapter 6: The Impact of the Supreme Court Ruling in the Brown v. Board of Education Case on Activism among Children. 16

Chapter 7: Conclusion. 17

References. 19

Chapter 1: Introduction

Today, discussions on the civil rights movement are dominated by a debate on the role played by different people across the country. However, the contribution of children to this all-important struggle is often ignored.[1] Consequently, brave children and teens have become the unsung heroes of the struggle for black Americans’ civil rights struggle that started during the 1950s. It is unfortunate that contemporary scholars have failed to share this hidden story.[2] This has greatly contributed to a situation where parents and teachers continue to miss an opportunity to inspire today’s children.

Place Order

The thesis of this paper is that children are the unsung heroes of the American civil rights movement during the 1950s and 1960s; without their participation in demonstrations and protests, the civil rights movement would not have made significant gains by attracting the attention of federal authorities and inspiring landmark legislative reforms aimed at eradicating racial segregation. The paper’s aim is to highlight different situations where children contributed to the civil rights struggle. It sets out to demonstrate that these events have not been accorded the attention it deserves, making children the unsung heroes of the struggle. It also promotes the view that without the participation of children and teens, the civil rights movement would not have achieved its objectives in a compelling manner as it did.

Chapter 2: The Role of Children in the Civil Rights Movement

In 1963, young people were used to rejuvenating the desegregation drive in Birmingham, Alabama under the auspices of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).[3] This strategy was attractive because it would cause minimal disruption to black families. The level of disruption was reduced because young people paid the ultimate sacrifice by serving jail time while parents continued working to enable them to take care of their families. This strategy involved recruiting many elementary, junior high school, and even elementary school students to participate in protest marches. For example, on 2 May 1963, authorities some 959 children, followed by about 1,000 more the following day, for marching to protest racial discrimination. During the same day, an event that shocked the nation unfolded, whereby police used powerful fire hoses to disperse protesting children.

By 6 May, some 2,500 black Americans, the majority of them children, had been put in custody. Most white business owners started feeling that the pressure from the civil rights movement was becoming unbearable, and hence accepted to embark on the process of integrating their establishments. Henceforth, it became uncommon for America to experience protests in which almost all participants were teenagers and children. In some cases, the children’s demonstrators even went to the extent of forming mass-organizing groups. A case in point is the Freedom Ferriday Movement (FFM), a group that high school students used to mobilize a petition-circulation drive in which they called on the federal government to offer protection for their rights, persons, and property.

The Birmingham demonstrations were unique because they marked a turning point for the civil rights movement and America as a nation. A record number of high school students and children participating in demonstrations had been sent to jail. Since that time, there was a sharp increase in the number of children participating in protests across the country. Many demonstrations unfolded in New York; Los Angeles; Danville, Virginia; Jackson, Mississippi; Cambridge, Maryland; and Gadsden, Alabama.[4] Many other cities also experienced demonstrations as thousands of blacks sought to oppose racial discrimination. In all, about 12,500 arrests were made following demonstrations in the three months since the start of the Birmingham desegregation drive.[5]

All states in the South experienced demonstrations by the civil rights movement, within children and college students playing a critical role.[6] All age lines were represented in these demonstrations – from elementary school to grandparents. It is unfortunate that the contribution of young children across class lines has been overlooked by historians. For instance, historians have failed to provide critical analysis of deaths of young people and how they contributed to the realization of the objectives of the civil rights movement.

A landmark incident that has not received the attention it deserves in the literature on the civil rights struggle is one where Barbara Johns, a student at Moton High School in Farmville, Virginia. The school had been segregated; some 450 students were compelled to crowd a school with a capacity of only 200. Due to its segregated status, the school encountered numerous problems, including leaky roofs and lack of books, supplies, and school buses. Barbara missed the school bus one morning and stood by the roadside hoping that someone would help her to reach school. A bus carrying white schoolchildren passed by and drove off. Barbara felt infuriated and vowed to lead a walkout by the entire student body of her school.

Few Americans today know about Barbara John’s actions, yet they culminated in a two-week students strike that attracted the attention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).[7] The NAACP offered to assist the striking students and urged them to sue for the establishment of an integrated school rather than the construction of a separate school equal to that of white children. The court case was one of the five that the US Supreme Court reviewed in its 1954 case of Brown v. Board of Education, in which it declared segregation unconstitutional.[8] Barbara Johns paid costly for her courage in opposing segregation when her family home was burned down.

There were many situations where brave children opposed racial discrimination just like Barbara Johns did.[9] If highlighted, these situations would inspire Americans by enlightening them about children’s important contributions to efforts aimed at integrating community centers, lunch counters, and sports leagues. One may argue that young activists faded into history mainly because during the early days of the civil rights movement, they did not fit the image that the leaders of the movement sought to project. For instance, these young students may have been considered too immature, rebellious, or militant to be used as rallying symbols.

In 1955, Rosa Parks, a middle-aged woman became famous for taking her stand by refusing to give up her bus seat to a white passenger. The US Congress even accorded her the title “the mother of the American freedom movement”. Nine months before this incident, Claudette Colvin, a fifteen-year-old teenager, had done a similar thing; she had refused to give up her bus seat, leading to her arrest. Unlike Parks, Colvin did not become a household name. A major reason for this was because she became pregnant soon afterward. Civil rights leaders were concerned that if her case went to court, their detractors would attack her morals, thereby denting the image of the movement. They opted to highlight the case of 42-year-old Parks, who was an upstanding American citizen. Even when Colvin attended Parks’ funeral, she was only mentioned in passing during the memorial service.

As the number of protests in American cities increased, so did violence and death. Children were no doubt caught up in this mayhem, and many of them were killed. For example, a bombing of a Birmingham church led to the deaths of four black girls.[10] This bombing triggered more demonstrations, during which policemen killed a black boy who pelted cars of white Americans with stones. Since children were often at the heart of the action in these demonstrations, it is only prudent to recognize their contribution to the gains that the movement made. For example, the presence of demonstrating children lent credence to the notion that America needed to address the problem of growing racial pressure and the potential violence it portended for the country particularly in the aftermath of the Birmingham demonstrations. By this time, demonstrators had succeeded in attracting the attention of the federal government; President John F. Kennedy had addressed the nation about the emerging civil rights movement and new legislation aimed at promoting civil rights had been put before Congress.

Chapter 3: Children Participation and Political Issues within the Civil Rights Movement

            The issue of children participating in the civil rights struggle triggered disagreements within the movement itself. For instance, two top leaders of the movement, Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, disagreed about the recruitment of children and women for marches in Birmingham, Alabama. Malcolm X accused King of erring by putting children in harm’s way. Unlike King, who advocated for non-violent marches, Malcolm preferred armed self-defense.[11] The rationale for armed self-defense was to protect the dignity of black people through a display of genuine affection demonstrated by an unending quest to confront anyone who harmed their women and children. Opponents of nonviolence faulted the idea of “turning the other cheek”, terming it a sign of weakness.[12] Whereas King based his non-violent approach on his faith in Christian love and integration, Malcolm presented his radical approach as the ideal solution in his unwavering quest for complete racial separation.[13] 

            Despite the political controversy it triggered, the involvement of children during civil rights campaigns had become widely accepted by 1965. Nevertheless, the two strategies: non-violence and violence, continued to compete for the black community’s loyalty. The explicit non-violent strategy that Martin Luther King advocated for seemed to carry the day in part because it supported by numerous national organizations that promoted integration. In contrast, Malcolm X’s policy of complete separation was not properly articulated even though it revealed the behaviors and attitudes of the community in the face of serious violations of their civil rights. In many cases, proponents of armed self-defense were faced with the choice between democracy and principle, and many of them chose democracy.

            The failure by children’s contributions to be given the attention it deserves in contemporary civil rights discourse may be attributed to the American culture, which tends to simply historical phenomena into tidy stories. Because of this, Dr. King is hailed as the black Moses who provided leadership to black Americans in their journey to safety while the saintly Rosa Parks is universally recognized as the mother of the country’s civil rights movement. In some cases, American children even get exposure to stories about Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King during pre-school. Teaching focuses on such iconic personalities mainly because it simplifies the real history. Such an approach fails to take cognizance of the fact that the civil rights movement would still have happened without people like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King. The numerous efforts that revolting youths made to attract the attention of federal authorities to their plight under the bane of racial discrimination should be incorporated into the rewritten version of this history of the movement. In that case, the resulting story would resonate with the young people of today.

Insights into the actions of brave young people who participated in the civil rights struggle can give today’s children a moral compass for guiding them on a wide spectrum of issues other than civil rights. However, for political reasons, the old guard seems unwilling to share the glory, instead choosing to protect civil-rights icons’ legacies. These legacies are mainly being protected through institutions whose leaders often refuse to get involved in initiatives that seek to recognize the participation of teenagers and children in the civil rights movement.  For example, the Rosa & Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development chose to stay away from “381 Days”, a traveling exhibit organized by the Smithsonian Institution. The aim of the exhibit was to provide an account of the Montgomery Bus Boycott that lasted 381 days, triggered by Parks’ arrest. It showed not only how Mrs. Parks sparked the movement but also recognizes the participation of some 50,000 people, many of them children, by joining the boycott and choosing to work miles to work and school. A major objective of the Smithsonian Institution was to recognize the efforts of any unsung heroes. It was more or less an attempt to dispel the notion that the buy boycott was a lone act of heroism and to replace it with a more objective, powerful overview of the events that followed Mrs. Parks’ arrest.

Chapter 4: Young Southern Blacks’ Contribution to Renewed Vigor in the Civil Rights Movement

            The Southern civil rights movement could not have been a success without the participation of teenagers and children. Through speeches and demonstrations, young people brought new energy into the movement. Unlike their parents, young people were frustrated by what they termed too much patience by their forefathers. In most youth rallies, the most dominant message was about the need to be aggressive in fighting for equal rights.[14] They even opposed the idea of “we have a dream” and instead rooted for the notion of “we have a plan”. Through such an aggressive stance, the youths of the 1950s and early 1960s were determined to achieve feats that had proven to be beyond the reach of activists in the 1930s and 1940s.

            Among young people, a dominant notion was that their elders had been too patient and fearful in their clamor for equality.[15] The young generation sought to counteract that by being direct, forceful, and precise in their demands. Despite the lack of attention from scholars, the young people’s approach was viewed by most observers as radically different particularly as reflected by the objectives they seek to achieve from the uprising. Apart from pouring out the anger pent up in many generations of oppression and racial discrimination, they sought to seize the opportunity to defy prevailing fears about activism. Expectedly, they were ready to rebel against a culture that required them to confirm the status quo characterized by a conservative approach to politics.

            Children and youths were affected directly by the extreme levels of segregation that was being experienced during the 1950s and 1960s. They understood that they stood to benefit immensely from the establishment of integrated schools. They were also infuriated by the abuses subjected to them by white segregationists. Rather than causing psychological damage to them, the abuses turned these children into hardened protestors. However, the dangers of trauma and the actual risk of bodily harm and death during protests greatly contributed to the growing weight and validity of the various cases that the NAACP took to the US Supreme Court. This demonstrates that children contributed significantly to progress in the civil rights movement albeit in an indirect way.

            Some scholars have examined the issue of youth activism during the 1960s in relation to the organizing tradition of African Americans.[16] In this regard, this culture is often contrasted with the liberal approach adopted by young white volunteers. For blacks, an outstanding characteristic was the unexpected and outstanding nature of the protests and demonstrations. In this case, it is worthwhile to point out that the participation of children was not restricted to blacks; even white segregationists were good at enlisting students in their cause. They were being incited to march from coast to coast to counteract the gains made by Negro demonstrations, which they claimed were communist-inspired. Such rhetoric is a reflection of the racial stereotypes that dominated the psyche of young people, both white and black.

Chapter 5: Reasons for Children’s Participation in the Civil Rights Movement

            The young civil rights activists of the 1950s and 1960s were greatly influenced by the highly charged ideological environment in which they had been brought up. Many of them had been brought up during the World War II years and the subsequent onset of the Cold War. The US had participated in World War II for cooperation and promotion of democracy. The involvement was also geared towards campaigning against violence. These ideas were repeatedly highlighted in schools as well in the media. Consequently, school children became ideal recipients of democratic messages that enabled them to develop stable moral stances.  

Young people in America were influenced by the post-war ideologies in a more radical way than adults simply because they were exposed to them during their formative years.[17] Over time, national ideologies became an integral part of the children’s idiosyncratic conscience. In America, the exposure to different ideological conceptions meant that children were in a better position to reconcile their personal identity with national identity, with the likely outcome being concerted efforts to challenge the status quo. Moreover, the ability to evaluate domestic events from the perspective of the contemporary international environment greatly emboldened the children to challenge the social rules that had led to a centuries-long process of perpetuating racial discrimination. The children’s confidence arose from their understanding of democratic messages that dominated the war and postwar years. Through such messages, they were able to understand their nation, to understand themselves, as well as the role they need to play to enhance its wellbeing.

It has become common for civil rights movement scholars to attribute the emergence of civil rights protests during the late 1950s and early 1960s to changing expectations among the young generation of that time.[18] These scholars are largely correct in their assessment of the post-war American society and the political-ideological realities within which it existed. World War II wildly raised expectations of a better society among black Americans. Many returning soldiers were very hopeful that the federal government would protect their rights as American citizens by destroying all the country’s undemocratic practices and laws. Young people were also optimistic that America would overpower the problem of racism once and for all. Racial injustice was the last thing children of former servicemen wanted to see directed towards their parents. They did not understand why their parents should go abroad to fight for their country only to face humiliation through racial discrimination upon returning home.

Even those children whose parents did not serve in the war grew in an environment characterized by the democratic rhetoric and ideology of the postwar era. Consequently, they were more conversant with recent historical events that had a significant impact on their lives. They regarded themselves as champions of freedom, tolerance, and social justice. For instance, Negro youth, more than ever before, became conscious of different elements of political discrimination. The level of consciousness among students across the country about the value of democracy in terms of rights and privileges increased dramatically. Based on this understanding, the students questioned the rationale for democratic rhetoric in a country where blacks were being subjected to segregation. As a result, they felt that the natural thing for federal authorities to do was to grant them rights and privileges that were a reflection of America’s democratic values.

The yearning for improvement in racial attitudes was observed among both white and black youths. In particular, members of the NAACP youth council were highly supportive of the idea of intercultural education aimed at promoting race relations. This observation is correct because some young people only became involved in the movement after attending the country’s first integrated schools. At the same time, the wide range of experiences that children from different parts of the country went through provided a platform for meaningful social exchanges that yielded numerous initiatives aimed at improving racial attitudes. This improvement greatly contributed to tolerance in times of protests and demonstrations. For example, students who learned different things about racial discrimination during coursework tended to take the issue of the clamor for equality very seriously. This is precisely what Bob Zellner, a future activist, and his four classmates, did at Huntington College, an all-white institution in Alabama.[19] These students derived their understanding of the race problem through a sociology course on racial relations; they were compelled to withdraw from school after the administration found out that they were planning to become part of the Montgomery Improvement Association with a view to undertaking research on the “racial problem”.[20]

During the early 1960s, numerous programs that were in place encouraged children to enquire more about civil rights activism. There was an implicit feeling about the need for people to work towards becoming an integral part of a harmonious world. That is why young people took the opportunity to join activism whenever an opportunity presented itself. In particular, black children who understood the world fairly well quickly learn that they did not stand against the world but rather against American color prejudice and narrowness. Young white minds were also changed by the existing opportunities for enlightenment as well. For example, young servicemen who had experienced the horrors of racial abuses against the black race tended to adopt a more liberal stance in regards to racial relations; they argued that everything, including racial attitudes, would be better in America.

Of course, lack of Negro’s educational opportunities also inspired disillusioned children to join the civil rights movement. Many young blacks yearned to have achievements comparable to those of whites. Many young blacks’ attitudes were shaped by federal authorities’ efforts to highlight the need for inter-racial equality. However, they were frustrated that such efforts bordered on political rhetoric and nothing much were being on the ground to bridge the widening black-white opportunity gap. Unlike elder black Americans, children were more willing to envision a future in which all democratic ideals elaborated in the American society would be actualized through the fight against racial discrimination.

 Historians have failed to cast the spotlight on numerous youth-centered events that shaped young black’s views while at the same time strengthening their expectations about the prospects of an American society where social equality prevailed.[21] For example, in the Brown case, the ruling of the Supreme Court upheld the civil rights of all black American children. In another incident, Emmett Till, a fourteen-year-old black teenager, was murdered. This death infuriated many black American children, thereby thrusting many of them to the heart of the nation’s aggressive struggle for racial integration. It is not coincidental that black children became markedly more militant in the years that followed the Supreme Court Ruling that outlawed segregated schools while recognizing civil rights as a birthright for every black child. The Supreme Court went as far as to urge children to be at the forefront of efforts to reorient the existing sociopolitical order.

Chapter 6: The Impact of the Supreme Court Ruling in the Brown v. Board of Education Case on Activism among Children

Brown v. Board of Education was a landmark court case in the US in which the Supreme Court ruled that state laws that established different schools for white and black Americans were unconstitutional.[22] The court stated that separation of educational facilities based on race was characterized by inherent inequality, and the resulting de jure racial segregation violated the Equal Protection Clause as stipulated in the Fourteenth Amendment of the US constitution. This landmark ruling marked was a major victory for the American civil rights movement because it triggered a process of integrating the country’s schools.

Scott Baker, a leading historian, is one of the scholars who have demonstrated that the move by the Supreme Court to repudiate state-sponsored racial segregation inspired black activism.[23] Baker gives the example of students in South Carolina, who felt that ruling opened new educational opportunities.[24] Another example is that of Lolis Elie, a youth activist who worked for the NAACP while studying at Dillard University in New Orleans. Elis attributed the growing consciousness among young people of his generation to the Supreme Court ruling in the Brown case. The case created a situation where the idea of integrating schools was introduced to many school children.

The Supreme Court ruling was also instrumental n raising the consciousness of young American whites as well.[25] Many white youths were forced to think about the issue of segregation and the evil is represented as a symbol of racial discrimination and economic inequality in America. In some cases, the ruling seemed to reinforce the view that it did not matter which race one belonged; every child had been affected by the problem of segregation. It was upon American children to choose whether their convictions were going to be defined based on color. Those children, both white and black, who subscribed to the notion of integration and racial equality easily commanded higher moral ground and had an opportunity to lead the way in the civil rights movement, or at the very least identify with it.

Chapter 7: Conclusion

This paper has focused on five core issues relating to the participation of children in the American civil rights movement. The first part has outlined the role that children played in this long racial struggle. From this analysis, it is evident that the contribution of children, young students, and teens has not been accorded the attention it deserved in historical literature. The second part has highlighted how this participation fitted in with contemporary political antagonism. It is evident that older crop of the civil rights movement leaders was unwilling to embrace students and school as symbols of the struggle. They were concerned that opponents of the desegregation movement would find numerous faults in the way the children carried themselves during demonstrations, thereby tarnishing the image of the movement. The political dimension also cast the spotlight on differences in the approaches adopted by Dr. Martin Luther King (who advocated for integration through non-violent demonstrations) and Malcolm X (who advocated for the radical approach of complete separation through armed self-defense and violent struggle).

In the fourth part, research evidence shows how young Southern blacks contributed to the renewed vigor with which the movement sought to achieve its objective of racial equality during the 1950s and 1960s. The children understood what it meant to suffer because of racial segregation. They were also aware that the failure of the centuries-old demeanor of patience and fear in the face of the dominant ideology of white supremacy had failed to liberate them from the bondage of racial discrimination. Thus, they felt that it was their turn to change the destiny of black Americans once and for all. Chapter five has highlighted the main reasons for this relived consciousness among young black Americans; in the post-World War II context, the black children understood the world fairly well quickly to the extent of learning that they did not stand against the world but rather against American color prejudice and narrowness.

Lastly, the Supreme Court Ruling in the Brown v. Board of Education Case made segregation in the American education system illegal. This made black youths and children to gain confidence in the fight against white oppression. In conclusion, this paper confirms the thesis that children are the unsung heroes of the American civil rights movement during the 1950s and 1960s. Without their participation in demonstrations and protests, the civil rights movement would not have made significant gains by attracting the attention of federal authorities and inspiring landmark legislative reforms aimed at eradicating racial segregation. It is unfortunate that the contribution of these children has not been accorded the attention it deserves in American historical literature.

References

Carawan, Guy and Candie Carawan. Sing for Freedom: The Story of the Civil Rights Movement Through Its Songs. Montgomery: NewSouth Books, 2007.

Collier-Thomas, Bettye and Vincent Franklin. (eds.) Sisters in the Struggle: African American Women in the civil rights black power movement. New York: New York University Press, 2001.

Danns, Dionne. Something better for our children: Black organizing in Chicago public schools, 1963-1971. Berkeley: Psychology Press, 2003.

Estes, Steve. I Am a Man!: Race, Manhood, and the Civil Rights Movement. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2005.

Hall, Jacquelyn. “The Long Civil Rights Movement and the Political Uses of the Past.” The Journal of American History, 91, no. 4 (2005): 1233-1263.

Harris, Fredrick. “It Takes a Tragedy to Arouse Them: Collective Memory and Collective Action during the Civil Rights Movement.” Social Movement Studies: Journal of Social, Cultural and Political Protest, 5, no. 1 (2006): 19-43.

Hill, Lance. The Deacons for Defense: Armed Resistance and the Civil Rights Movement. London: Routledge, 2004.

Hill, Lance. The Deacons for Defense: Armed Resistance and the Civil Rights Movement. Raleigh: University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

Holt, Mikel. Not Yet Free at Last: The Unfinished Business of the Civil Rights Movement: Our Battle for School Choice. Montgomery: ICS Press, 2000.

Hudson-Weems, Clenora. Emmett Till: The sacrificial lamb of the civil rights movement. Chicago: Bedford Publishers, 2000.

Joseph, Peniel. (ed.) The Black Power Movement: Rethinking the Civil Rights-Black Power Era. New York: Routledge, 2006.

Levine, Ellen. Freedom’s children: young civil rights activists tell their own stories. New York: Penguin Books, 2000.

Marsh, Charles. The beloved community: How faith shapes social justice, from the civil rights movement to today, New York: Basic Books, 2008.

Olson, Lynne. Freedom’s Daughters: The unsung heroines of the civil rights movement from 1830 to 1970. New York: Penguin Books, 2001.

Patterson, James, and William Freehling. Brown V. Board of Education: A Civil Rights Milestone and Its Troubled Legacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Reed, Thomas. The art of protest: Culture and activism from the civil rights movement to the streets of Seattle. Saint Paul: University of Minnesota Press, 2005.

Romano, Renee, and Leigh Raiford. (Eds.) The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory.  Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2006.

Schweinitz, Rebecca. If we could change the world: Young people and America’s long struggle for racial equality. Raleigh: University of North Carolina Press, 2009.

Sullivan, Patricia. Lift Every Voice: The NAACP and the Making of the Civil Rights Movement. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Williams, Juan. Eyes on the Prize: America’s civil rights years, 1954-1965. New York: Penguin Books, 2013.

Yeazell, Stephen. “Brown, The Civil Rights Movement, and the Silent Litigation Revolution.” Vanderbilt Law Review, 2, no. 8 (2004): 212-218.

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End Notes

[1] Danns, Dionne. Something better for our children: Black organizing in Chicago public schools, 1963-1971. Berkeley: Psychology Press, 2003.

[2] Holt, Mikel. Not Yet Free at Last: The Unfinished Business of the Civil Rights Movement: Our Battle for School Choice. Montgomery: ICS Press, 2000.

[3] Levine, Ellen. Freedom’s children: young civil rights activists tell their own stories. New York: Penguin Books, 2000.

[4] Olson, Lynne. Freedom’s Daughters: The unsung heroines of the civil rights movement from 1830 to 1970. New York: Penguin Books, 2001.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Collier-Thomas, Bettye and Vincent Franklin. (eds.) Sisters in the Struggle: African American Women in the civil rights black power movement. New York: New York University Press, 2001.

[7] Carawan, Guy and Candie Carawan. Sing for Freedom: The Story of the Civil Rights Movement Through Its Songs. Montgomery: NewSouth Books, 2007.

[8] Yeazell, Stephen. “Brown, The Civil Rights Movement, and the Silent Litigation Revolution.” Vanderbilt Law Review, 2, no. 8 (2004): 212-218.

[9] Harris, Fredrick. “It Takes a Tragedy to Arouse Them: Collective Memory and Collective Action during the Civil Rights Movement.” Social Movement Studies: Journal of Social, Cultural and Political Protest, 5, no. 1 (2006): 19-43.

[10] Hudson-Weems, Glenora. Emmett Till: The sacrificial lamb of the civil rights movement. Chicago: Bedford Publishers, 2000.

[11] Hill, Lance. The Deacons for Defense: Armed Resistance and the Civil Rights Movement. Raleigh: University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

[12] Ibid.

[13] Estes, Steve. I Am a Man!: Race, Manhood, and the Civil Rights Movement. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2005.

[14] Reed, Thomas. The art of protest: Culture and activism from the civil rights movement to the streets of Seattle. Saint Paul: University of Minnesota Press, 2005.

[15] Marsh, Charles. The beloved community: How faith shapes social justice, from the civil rights movement to today, New York: Basic Books, 2008.

[16] Sullivan, Patricia. Lift Every Voice: The NAACP and the Making of the Civil Rights Movement. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

[17] Williams, Juan. Eyes on the Prize: America’s civil rights years, 1954-1965. New York: Penguin Books, 2013.

[18] Romano, Renee and Leigh Raiford. (Eds.) The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory.  Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2006.

[19] Schweinitz, Rebecca. If we could change the world: Young people and America’s long struggle for racial equality. Raleigh: University of North Carolina Press, 2009.

[20] Ibid.

[21] Hill, Lance. The Deacons for Defense: Armed Resistance and the Civil Rights Movement. London: Routledge, 2004.

[22] Hall, Jacquelyn. “The Long Civil Rights Movement and the Political Uses of the Past.” The Journal of American History, 91, no. 4 (2005): 1233-1263.

[23] Joseph, Peniel. (ed.) The Black Power Movement: Rethinking the Civil Rights-Black Power Era. New York: Routledge, 2006.

[24] Ibid.

[25] Patterson, James and William Freehling. Brown V. Board of Education: A Civil Rights Milestone and Its Troubled Legacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.